Monday • 12/18/2023 •
Monday of the Third Week of Advent, Year Two
This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 41; Psalm 52; Zechariah 1:7–17; Revelation 3:7–13; Matthew 24:15–31
This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 9 (“The First Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 12:2–6, BCP, p. 86); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 19 (“The Song of the Redeemed,” Revelation 15:3–4, BCP, p. 94)
Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we explore that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd. Thanks for joining me this Monday of the Third Week of Advent. This new Christian year finds us in Year 2 of the Daily Office Lectionary.
Zechariah: words of comfort and visions of hope
A student discovers she is going to have to retake a course because, well, things didn’t go swimmingly the first time around. Her teacher says, “I’m proud of your resilience. I know you’ll get it this time.” A church worker is fired, and he is deep in a “slough of despond.” A friend shows up at his home and says, “I’m sorry nobody was there to speak up for you, but I’m here for you now. And, you know what? You’re going to be OK.”
After a dark night of the soul, words of comfort and a vision of hope—they mean the world.
The happy task of the prophet Zechariah (whose name means “Yah remembers”) is to speak words of comfort and to offer visions of hope to dejected, disheartened, and drained returnees from the 70 year long Babylonian Captivity. The task before them is monumental: to rebuild Jerusalem and its fallen temple, to restore vibrant and sacrificial worship, and to renew Israel’s calling to model for the world how justice, mercy, truth, and love can govern life.
In the course of one night in 520 B.C. some five months after Jerusalemites have begun to rebuild their city wall, Zechariah receives eight visions of hope for his discouraged fellow countrymen.
Today’s reading in Zechariah recounts the first of those visions. Angels on horseback appear to him, offering a message of hope from God: “Then the LORD replied with gracious and comforting words to the angel who talked with me” (Zechariah 1:13). Yahweh wants his people to know three things.
Yahweh is still the God of mercy. Despite allowing his people to endure the consequences of their covenant-violations, Yahweh has never stopped being who he essentially is: the God of mercy and compassion. I’m reminded of the words of the Prayer of Humble Access: “But thou art the same Lord, whose property is always to have mercy….” Jerusalemites of Zechariah’s day could count on that fact, So can you and I! So can the student taking her course a second time. So can the dismissed church worker.
Wrongs against God’s people have not gone unnoticed. “I am extremely angry with the nations that are at ease; for while I was only a little angry, they made the disaster worse” (Zechariah 1:15). It is a curious twist in biblical historiography that God weaves nonbelievers into his redemptive designs. Abram and Melchizedek are interlaced in order to demonstrate God’s grace. Even Egypt is a refuge for Israelites from famine, until the imposition of slavery. The Persian king Cyrus is Judah’s “Savior,” because he proclaims release from captivity in Babylonian.
But God had also employed the mighty, destructive, and terrifying armies of Assyria and Babylon to execute the curses of covenant-violation. However, the violence that Assyria and Babylon unleashed against God’s wayward people far exceeded what God’s justice called for. Yahweh wants his people to know that their innocent and undeserved tears have not gone unnoticed. In his own time and in his own way, Yahweh will balance things out.
They don’t have to take matters into their own hands. They don’t have to wallow in self-doubt or surrender their souls to self-destructive bitterness. They can leave recompense in the hands of the Divine Enforcer. That truth is as good in our day as it was in the day of the prophet whose name means “Yah remembers.” He remembered then, and he remembers still.
Prosperity lies in his people’s future. “Thus says the Lord of hosts: My cities shall again overflow with prosperity; the Lord will again comfort Zion and again choose Jerusalem” (Zechariah 1:17). Looking beyond Zechariah, the season of Advent reminds us that we have read to the end of the story, and we know its happy outcome.
To that end, John records the letter to the beleaguered church in Philadelphia (1st century Asia Minor): “Because you have kept my word of patient endurance, I will keep you from the hour of trial that is coming on the whole world to test the inhabitants of the earth. I am coming soon; hold fast to what you have, so that no one may seize your crown. If you conquer, I will make you a pillar in the temple of my God; you will never go out of it. I will write on you the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem that comes down from my God out of heaven, and my own new name” (Revelation 3:10–12).
What awaits the members of God’s city is a rich and wonderful future, one that more than offsets the trials, the failures, and the disappointments of this age. May you and I rest in the confidence of that great truth this Advent season, all the while living boldly and without regret, second-guessing, or bitterness.
Be blessed this day,
Reggie Kidd+